The context is as follows- a newbie harmonica player was asking if the way they held the harmonica in their mouth was incorrect(kind of slanted, cocked to the side + diagonally). I told him that the way he held it was fine & wanted to further explain how it doesn't exactly matter what angle you hold the harmonica to one's lips/mouth, what's important is using 100% of your air w/o wasting any of the pressure, which is like an accordion- put a hole in the accordion's stretchy bit and it still plays, but badly. Also any accordion players, please feel free to ream me, 'cause I only ever owned a toy accordion 9 years ago, not 100% sure if what I said about it is accurate(namely a button to release air w/o activating the reeds/notes)
A harmonica & an accordion in many ways are the same instrument:
When playing accordion they push & pull it together to force the air out its reeds- on a harmonica you pick which hole to produce a different note, the accordion player presses a different key which lets air flow out a different reed.
The stretchy coiled part in the middle is called the diaphragm. You also have a diaphragm & it essentially performs the same purpose for the harmonica as it does in the accordion.
Now, if the accordion's diaphragm gets a hole torn in it it loses pressure. It may still play if you press only one key down, but their tone is weak & wheezy, and the reeds may not activate if you pressed many keys at once to play a chord, because there's not enough air pressure.
If you've ever heard that it's best practice to be standing up while playing harmonica, that's why- you want your diaphragm to be able to use 100% of its available space & contents of air. Notice that the accordion can't change how much air it brings in or puts out really, except by hitting more keys which leads to more holes with more reeds or by hitting a button that releases pressure without activating a reed.
Now let's say there is an accordion player who has played for 30 years, but he has an accordion with a hole in its diaphragm- no matter how much experience and knowledge he has, his play will sound worse because of this loss in pressure.
This is the bit relevant to your question: Your diaphragm, lungs, throat & lips are an air tight system & when you play the harmonica you want to maintain as airtight of an enclosure around the harmonica as possible- a harmonica player who has played for 30 years, like an accordion, will not sound their absolute best if their technique is causing them to waste any of that potential air pressure-
tl;dr angle, tilt, upside down, all are fine as long as you're not 'putting a hole somewhere between the harmonica's reeds & your diaphragm'.
There is a caveat. The accordion player has that button which lets off pressure without releasing it through the reeds- on the one hand, it's used to get it stretched or scrunched to its min/max level without making a sound, but also it can be used to intentionally make play breathier, quieter, softer, etc, whereas not pressing it would make it punchier, harder. Again, though, this is because both instruments operate on the same fundamental principle: you can't play harder or punchier by blowing or sucking harder, this simply results in a harsher strained tone- Ideally you are seeking to maximize your use of pressure NOT the quantity of air; when the accordion is working properly & optimally, it's not that you can move more air, it's that you're not wasting any pressure or if you're 'wasting' it it's intentionally ie for softer breathier stuff to contrast with punchier full pressure tone.
just as a final food for though, i started out on pucker. the more you play though as long as you maintain regular practice you'll always be improving & picking up new techniques and nuances to the instrument- so maybe you don't intentionally sit down to master tongue rolling/pucker, BUT you just pick up on the gist of it- if you can then go tongue block bend-pucker bend-tongue, they may both be the same note but they have a different tone to them, giving more flavor. This ties back to your question about slant too though-
Pucker bend: For me I'd put the harp as far in my mouth, tilting the part the sound comes out up toward the ceiling with the holes on my bottom lips top: literally it is my puckering & slightly opening and closing my bottom lips enclosure(technical term iirc is embouchure) which increases and decreases the air pressure pushing on the reed- you can further adjust this by slightly tilting & twisting the harmonica because you're essentially making an even smaller hole, increasing the amount of pressure, increasing the bend. Much much later if you get to advanced harmonica technique, the effect air pressure has on the reeds is equivalent to a guitarist's finger on his strings: If he applies force to the left & right he can bend his notes in unusual ways- diatonic harmonica players also do this, by focusing air pressure it presses harder on the reeds which is what produces its bluesy sound & allows for example a C natural diatonic harmonica(only has variations on the C scale CDEFGABC repeated more or less) to bend almost all its notes into flats/sharps
Submitted September 13, 2022 at 12:26PM by piwithekiwi https://www.reddit.com/r/Learnmusic/comments/xdaj4k/advice_on_playing_harmonica_how_you_a_harmonica/?utm_source=ifttt